Credit: AP

ORLANDO, Fla. — Fabricio Paulino de Melo, known to American basketball audiences by the more NBA-friendly Fab Melo, grew up an hour inland of Rio de Janeiro in the town of Juiz de Forz.

Kids who play soccer in the United States get spoiled by lush fields and uniforms. The most common field in Juiz de Forz was any street without a lot of traffic. The narrow contours of those Brazilian roads forced youngsters to work on controlling the ball, keeping possession, and passing and shooting in a tight area. Great foot movement develops under these conditions, and Melo, even as he started to cast a growing shadow over his shorter friends, was no different.

But he also was frustrated.

By the time Melo reached his early teens and was well on his way to his 7-foot height, everyone wanted him to play goalkeeper. His heroes were Ronaldo and Ronaldinho, and Melo wanted to be Brazil’s next great center midfielder or striker.

But peer pressure got in the way. He tried Brazil’s next most popular sport, volleyball, and hated it as much as playing goal. Basketball, No.â€‰3 on the national list, was next, and the game clicked for Melo about five years ago.

His overall skills are rudimentary, but as the Celtics know, despite being glued in the middle of Syracuse’s zone for two seasons, his foot movement is exceptional. He was one of the few college players who could block shots and draw charges, as Celts general manager Danny Ainge likes to point out.

Pick-and-roll defense is the next step, and Melo’s foot speed has proven to be a great asset.

“It definitely helped me,” said the Celtics rookie, who had five rebounds and a block in the Celtics’ 82-73 win against Brooklyn yesterday in the Orlando Summer League. “But that’s how it is. Kids in Brazil play soccer. That’s what we did. We didn’t need goal (nets). We just ran up and down. It definitely helped my footwork for basketball. I can move very well. I’m good laterally.”

It’s not uncommon for international players to come into the NBA with this one skill.

“Of course, some of the Brazilian (NBA) players like Nene will tell you that they were great soccer players,” laughed Rodrigo Viegas, Melo’s business manager. “But it’s true. I don’t know about (Manu) Ginobili specifically, but almost all of the NBA players from Argentina started with soccer. You see it in some of the guys from Africa who come over to the NBA like Serge Ibaka. They all grew up playing soccer, and as a result, they really know how to move.

“If you surveyed most of the international guys in the NBA, you would find that most of them played soccer.”

Those beginnings, of course, are just the start for Melo. Good hands, rather than good feet, might be an even rarer commodity for young NBA big men, and Melo’s offensive game is raw.

But at least he has an important building block.

“I developed it more in the last year,” said Melo, who improved considerably between his freshman and sophomore years at Syracuse. “A lot of teams didn’t know I have this footwork, and they said I couldn’t play offense. That’s just something I have to work on. I played basketball for six years, so I don’t have that experience to play one-on-one in a game situation. When I get comfortable playing, I will be better.”

He already has demonstrated a clear ability to block shots and, perhaps even more significantly, stay in front of quicker players.

“It came naturally, staying in front of people, but that also had to do with my heart,” he said. “I play with a lot of passion. I put a lot of effort into defense. I’m able to keep people in front of me and help my teammates.”

Kris Joseph, Melo’s Syracuse teammate taken by the Celtics with the 51st pick, can attest.

“You look at a guy like Steve Nash, who played soccer, and his footwork is tremendous,” Joseph said of his fellow Canadian. “That’s something I saw with Fab the first time he stepped into a practice at Syracuse, that he had amazing footwork. He’s quick on his feet. He gets to spots real quickly as a 7-footer. His reaction time is a lot better than a lot of guys that I know.

“He’s doing a good job with that so far, from playing a zone for two years to coming into this and learning all of the principles and the terminology. He’s showing (against picks) and doing everything he’s supposed to.”